Atoll Getting Started LTE 282 EN PDF

Atoll Getting Started - LTE

Version 2.8
Forsk China
Apr 2010
Version 2.8
GSM/GPRS/EDGE
UMTS/HSPA
LTE
CDMA2000 1xRTT/EV-DO
TD-SCDMA
WiMAX/BWA
Microwave Links
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Table of Contents
1 Introduction
Introduction...........................................................................................................................
........................................................................................................................... 4
2 Installation
Installation..............................................................................................................................
..............................................................................................................................
..............................................................................................................................55
3 Sequence of operations
operations.....................................................................................................
..................................................................................................... 8
3.1 New project..............................................................................................................9
3.2 Import of 3D maps................................................................................................ 11
3.2.1 Import of heights map.................................................................................. 12
3.2.2 Import of clutter map.................................................................................... 13
3.2.3 Import of vector map.................................................................................... 17
3.3 Setting a coordinate system............................................................................... 22
3.4 Network data setting............................................................................................ 26
3.4.1 Import of the Sites table.............................................................................. 27
3.4.2 Antenna parameters setting........................................................................32
3.4.3 Transmitters parameters setting................................................................ 37
3.4.3.1 Transmitters table......................................................................... 37
3.4.4 Cells parameters setting..............................................................................43
3.4.5 Import and export of Access database......................................................51
3.4.5.1 Import Access database.............................................................. 51
3.4.5.2 Export to Access database......................................................... 53
3.4.6 Add new sites................................................................................................55
3.4.6.1 Add new sites one by one........................................................... 55
3.4.6.2 Add a group of sites..................................................................... 56
3.4.6.3 Template management................................................................ 57
3.4.7 MIMO Setting................................................................................................ 60
3.4.8 ICIC Setting................................................................................................... 64
3.5 Propagation model............................................................................................... 65
3.5.1 SPM propagation model..............................................................................65
3.5.1.1 Import of CW measurements......................................................65
3.5.1.2 Automatic calibration of the SPM model................................... 76
3.5.1.3 Model validation with CW measurements.................................80
3.5.1.4 Set the propagation model for each transmitter.......................86
3.5.2 Cost-Hata model...........................................................................................87
3.5.2.1 Import of CW measurements......................................................87
3.5.2.2 Automatic calibration of the Cost-Hata model..........................87
3.5.2.3 Set the propagation model for each transmitter.......................90
3.6 Propagation matrix calculation........................................................................... 92
3.6.1 Preliminary work........................................................................................... 92
3.6.1.1 Resolution of predictions and receiver altitude........................ 92
3.6.1.2 Setting the Computation Zone....................................................93
3.6.2 Propagation and prediction studies calculation..................................... 100
3.6.2.1 Best server prediction................................................................ 101
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3.6.2.2 Coverage by Signal Level prediction.......................................105

3.6.2.3 Overlapping Zones prediction.................................................. 107
3.6.2.4 Force calculation........................................................................ 109
3.6.2.5 Prediction template management............................................ 109
3.7 Automatic Neighbours Allocation..................................................................... 110
Atoll allows the user to fill the neighbours table or add the neighbours manually
or allocate the neighbours automatically.................................................................110
3.7.1 Manually Allocation Feature......................................................................110
3.7.2 Automatically Allocation Feature.............................................................. 112
3.8 Frequency Allocation..........................................................................................116
3.8.1 Manual Frequency Allocation....................................................................116
3.8.2 Automatic Frequency Allocation............................................................... 117
3.9 Physical Cell ID Allocation................................................................................ 121
3.9.1 Manual PCI Allocation............................................................................... 121
3.9.2 Automatic PCI Allocation...........................................................................122
3.10 Simulations..........................................................................................................124
3.10.1 Traffic model................................................................................................124
3.10.1.1 Services....................................................................................... 124
3.10.1.2 Mobility types.............................................................................. 125
3.10.1.3 Terminals..................................................................................... 125
3.10.1.4 User profile.................................................................................. 126
3.10.1.5 Environments.............................................................................. 127
3.10.2 Creating Traffic Maps.................................................................................129
3.10.2.1 User profile environments......................................................... 131
3.10.2.2 User profile densities................................................................. 134
3.10.2.3 Sector traffic map....................................................................... 135
3.10.2.4 User density traffic map (no. of user/km2)..............................138
3.10.3 Subscriber list............................................................................................. 140
3.10.4 Simulation....................................................................................................148
3.11 Point Analysis function...................................................................................... 154
3.11.1 Profile........................................................................................................... 154
3.11.2 Reception.................................................................................................... 155
3.11.3 Interference................................................................................................. 157
3.11.4 Results......................................................................................................... 157
3.12 Other prediction studies.................................................................................... 159
3.12.1 Creating method......................................................................................... 159
3.12.2 Common Prediction Studies Setting........................................................162
3.13 LTE-TDD Setting................................................................................................ 165
3.14 Other features.....................................................................................................168
3.14.1 User configuration function....................................................................... 168
3.14.2 Store methods for path loss matrices......................................................171
3.14.3 Tips and tricks.............................................................................................172
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1 Introduction
This document explains the entire process from the import of network data in Atoll to the
production of prediction studies. The purpose of this document is to give an overall
understanding for radio engineers, who never use Atoll.
This document does not explain the algorithm and don’t give detailed explanation. The
user may find in the “Technical Reference Guide” and “User Manual” the concrete
algorithm and the detailed explanation of parameters.
The user may find all projects and map data in the CD, which was provided with this
document.
This document describes how to get started using the Atoll version 2.8.2.
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2 Installation
The installation of Atoll is simple and needs an Administrator profile.
1) The naming structure of the Atoll installation file generally is:

“Atoll.language.version_number.build_number.exe”, as shown bellow:
2) Before starting the installation of Atoll, the dongle has to be plugged in.
3) Install Atoll by double clicking on the installation file.
4) In the appeared dialog box, click on the “next” button and choose the installation
directory (the default path is C:\Program File\Forsk\Atoll). The minimum requirement
for the installation of Atoll is a disk space of 96.3MB.
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5) In the 3rd window the user may choose “Full installation”, “Compact installation” or
“Custom installation” and select the modules. The recommendation for a first
installation of Atoll is “Full installation”. Later update of Atoll doesn’t need to install
again the dongle driver for fixed license. If the user once uninstalled an old version
before the installation of a new one, the dongle driver has to be installed again.
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6) In the 4th window, fill in the “Domain”, “Username” and “Password” fields. If the user
don’t choose previously “Atoll calculation server”, then he doesn’t need to fill in any
information.
7) Click on the “Next” button to start the installation of Atoll. After the installation, the
computer needs to be restarted if Dongle Driver for fixed license has been chosen.
Atoll users need to pay attention for the following 3 points:

(1) For parallel dongle, it is recommended to insert or remove it only when the
computer is turned off.
(2) For USB dongle, if it still can not find the USB dongle driver after installing Atoll,
please download and install Sentinel Driver from the website:
http://www.safenet-inc.com/support/tech/sentinel.asp#
(3) If it is not necessary, don’t change the computer date when using Atoll.
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3 Sequence of operations
This following document presents how to establish an Atoll LTE project and to carry out
coverage predictions, simulations and production of reports:
(1) Open a existing project or build a new project
(2) Import network data
(3) “Best Server” and “Signal Level” coverage predictions
(4) Neighbour allocation
(5) Frequency planning (only for different frequency network)
(6) Physical Cell ID planning
(7) Traffic Modeling and production of traffic map
(8) Monte-Carlo simulation
(9) Signal quality and throughput coverage prediction studies
(10) Analyze of frequency planning
(11) Production of reports
The operation flow chart is represented in the following figure.
Open an existing project

or build a new project
-Network data setting

-Add network element
-Modify parameters
Standard prediction studies (Best server, Signal

level)
Automatic or manual neighbor allocation
Automatic or manual frequency planning
Automatic or manual Physical Cell ID planning
Traffic map
Monte-Carlo
Cell traffic load User-defined values
Simulation
User list
Signal quality,
Frequency analyze Prediction reports
throughput plot
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3.1 New project
After opening Atoll application, click on or select File->Open.
The project templates dialog box will appear. Choose LTE template.
Atoll opens a blank LTE project. The new project already includes the default antenna
database and propagation module set.
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Map window
Explorer window
Event viewer
The Atoll main window contains an Explorer Window, a Map Window and an Event viewer,
as seen in the figure above.
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3.2 Import of 3D maps

In the main tool bar, select “File->Import”.
In the appeared “Open” dialog box browse the geographical map folder.
Generally the following data maps need to be imported in Atoll: heights (map of the
altitude above sea level), clutter classes (type of land used) and vectors (vector maps).
The import order is optional. For this document, the order is heights->clutter->vectors.
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3.2.1 Import of heights map
1) In the “Open” dialog box, select the “\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and materials\Geo\
\Digital Terrain Model” folder in the CDROM. Select the “Brussels_DTM.bil” file and
click on “Open”
2) In the appeared “Data type” menu, select “Altitudes (DTM)” and click “Import”.
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3) After the map import, the following figure appears. The “heights” map is automatically
put on the left side in the explorer window under the “Geo” tab named “Digital Terrain
Model”
3.2.2 Import of clutter map
1) Select again “File->Import” in the main toolbar. In the “Open” dialog box, select the
“\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and materials\Geo\Clutter Classes” folder in the
CDROM. Select the “Brussels_Clutter_classes.bil” file and click on “Open”
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2) In the appeared “Data type” menu, select “Clutter Classes” and click on “Ok”
3) After the map is imported, the following figure appears. The clutter classes map is
automatically put on the left side in the explorer window under the “Geo” tab named
“Clutter Classes”
4) Double clicking on the “Clutter Classes” folder, opens the “Clutter Classes properties”
dialog box for the setting of clutter parameters. Select the “Description” tab and click
on the bottom right “Refresh” button. Atoll will filter the clutter classes, which are not
included in the clutter map. The following figure shows the filtered tab of clutter
classes.
The following parameters can be defined in the dialog box: Model Standard Deviation,
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C/I Standard Deviation, Indoor Loss, SU-MIMO Gain Factor etc.
5) These values have to be set according to the customer network, otherwise Atoll will
use default values for example 7dB for clutter standard deviation.
User may copy/paste setting table into Clutter Classes Properties dialog box from
LTE_Brussels_Network.xls in “\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and
materials\Reference_Data\Network_Data” folder of the CDROM, as below:
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6) In the “Display” tab, adjust the display color of each clutter type. Pay attention to the
“Display type” and the “Field”. The following figure is the suggested setting of
“Display” tab. Click on the color frame to change the color for each clutter type.
Select “Add to legend” to display information in the legend window. Use the
“Transparency” function to adjust the transparency of the map. The display of each clutter
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may be disabled by un-checking the right side check-box.
7) After settings the “Clutter Classes properties”, the clutter map will be displayed as
below
3.2.3 Import of vector map
1) Select again “File->Import” in the main toolbar. In the “Open” dialog box, select the
“\Atoll 282 LTE Demo projects and materials\Geo\Vectors” folder. Select all the files
and click on “Open”.
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2) In the appeared “Vector import” dialog box, select “New folder in ‘Geo’…” in the
drop-down menu of Import to, input folder name such as Vectors and click OK, then
click Import.
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3) After the map import, the following figure appears. The vector map is automatically
put on the left side in the explorer window under the “Geo” tab named “Vectors”.
4) Dragging the “Vectors” folder with the mouse to the top of the explorer window, the
“vector” map will be placed as the uppermost layer, as seen in the following figure.
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5) Double clicking on “Airport” in the “Vectors” folder, open the “airport properties” dialog
box, and select the “Display” tab, as seen in the following figure.
6) Clicking on the vector line to open the “Display” dialog box to set the color and style
of the vector line.
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7) As shown in the following figure, the color of the vector line is changed.
8) You may modify other vector files with the same operations as for the “airport” vector
file.
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3.3 Setting a coordinate system

Select “Tools->Options”, as shown in the following figure.
In the appeared “Options” dialog box, the “Projection” and “Display” can be defined in the
“Coordinate systems” frame.
1) First set the projection system (it can be known by reading the file “projection.txt” in
the “heights” folder). For the demo project the projection system is “WGS 84 UTM
zone 31N”.
Click on the right side of the “Projection” field, open “Coordinate systems”
dialog box and choose WGS84 UTM zones in the “Find in” drop-down menu.
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2) Then choose WGS 84/UTM zone 31N and click “OK”.
3) After the setting of parameters, the following dialog box is displayed.
4) Setting the “Display System”.
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The “Display system” function allows the user to choose the relative coordinates (X and Y,
unit in meter) or the longitude and latitude for the Map Window.
After having set the “Projection” system, Atoll automatically sets the “Display” system with
the same system as the “Projection” system, as shown in the figure above. The windows
map uses relative coordinate.
Here shows how to set for displaying the longitude and latitude.
Click on the right side of the “Display” field on the button and open the “Coordinate
Systems” dialog box. Select “WGS84 UTM zones” and choose the “WGS 84” system (with
an ellipsoidal symbol).
5) After the setting of parameters, the following dialog box is displayed.
6) After having set the “Coordinate” system, the Map Window displays the longitude and
latitude (“d” is degree, “m” is minute and “s” is second), as shown in the following
figure.
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7) The user can choose the “Degree Format” among the “xx°xx'xx.xx”, “xxdxxmxx.xxsS”
format (minute and second), the “xx.xxxxx” format (decimal base) or the “-xx.xxxxx”
format (decimal base and southern hemisphere expressed with the minus sign), as
shown in the following figure.
Note: If the user wants to use another projection system and wants to display the
longitude and latitude coordinates, then the display system has to be chosen
according to the projection system name. Moreover there is an ellipsoid symbol in
front of the display system.
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3.4 Network data setting

The setting of a LTE project in Atoll can be done for two different cases:
(1) The network is already deployed or the network data, including site location,
antenna patterns and so on, already exists.
(2) The network is not deployed and the user starts the network planning with site
placement in the planning tool.
The following part introduces the first case.
All data have to be prepared in Excel, before importing them. Atoll needs an Excel
document with network data including sites, antennas, transmitters and cells.
All necessary data for the setup of the Brussels project are in the
“LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document in the “\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and
materials\Reference_Data\Network_Data” folder.
The “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document has 5 worksheets. The network data are

contained in the first 4 worksheets and the others will be introduced later. BRU088_2
survey is CW test data used for propagation model calibration, it will be introduced on the
section of propagation model calibration.
The import of the network data must be done by a certain order. In Atoll, the order follows
the explorer window order. The following figure shows the order for the introduction of the
network data: Sites->Antenna->Transmitters->Cells.
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3.4.1 Import of the Sites table
1) Open the “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document and select the “Sites” worksheet.

It provides two sets of coordinate data: X/Y relative coordinate or Long./Lat.
coordinate.
Here we take Long./Lat. Coordinate for example, so we should set display system as
WGS 84.
If X.Y relative coordinate is used, then display system should be set as WGS 84 / UTM
zone 31N.
Note: If the display system is set with longitude and latitude, then the longitude and
latitude data should be transform to decimal base value.
2) Copy the columns “Site”, “Longitude” and “Latitude” (except the title line).
3) Under Data tab of the “Explorer/Data” window, double clicking on the “Sites” folder
(or right clicking on the “Sites” folder and select “Open Table”) will open the “Sites”
table, as shown in the following figure.
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4) In the “Sites” table, select the first cell and paste the data. Apart from the columns
“Site”, “Longitude” and “Latitude”, the others are automatically filled in with default
value. The Altitude will be automatically read from the height map according to the
location of the sites. Atoll will transform automatically the longitude and latitude form
decimal format to minutes and seconds format. The imported sites will be put in the
“Sites” folder of the “Explorer/Data” window with an alphabetic order, as shown in the
following figure.
5) If the user wants to delete one or several sites, he can delete them in the “Sites” table
or directly in the “Explorer/Data” window.
� In the “Sites” table, click on the left grey cell of one/several line(s), which contains the
site you want to delete, to select the entire line, and press the keyboard “delete”
button.
� In the “Explorer/Data” window, right click on the site which you want to delete and
select “delete” in the menu, as shown in the following figure.
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6) After the input of “Sites” data, the Map Window is automatically updated with the new
sites. In the following figure, a black circle represents a site.
7) Open the “Sites” properties dialog box (right click on the “Sites” folder and select
“properties”) to change the display attributes, as shown in the following figure.
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Choosing “Unique” allows only a unique color for the display of sites. Choosing “Discrete
values” or “Value intervals” allows colors displayed discretely or graded with certain
interval value. By default, a site is represented by a black circle.
If necessary, the symbol and color of sites can be changed, by selecting “Properties” in
the “Actions” dialog box. The appeared “Display” window allows the selection of color and
symbol.
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8) Site parameter introduction
Select “Properties” from right-click menu of sites to set site parameters.

Name：Site name
Position: Site location, the format(X/Y or Long/lat) is according to the Display system.
Altitude: DTM value is read from height map. The Altitude could be changed in Real
field, the DTM value will be ignored.
Comment: Custom information.
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3.4.2 Antenna parameters setting
Atoll needs the following antenna’s data: antenna name, antenna gain, antenna horizontal
and vertical patterns. Beamwidth, Fmin and Fmax are reference parameters and not used
for calculation. Atoll calculates and displays the electrical down tilt from the vertical pattern.
The calculated electrical down tilt is only given for information.
1) Select the “Antennas” sheet in the “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document. As seen
in the following figure, the horizontal and vertical patterns are provided.
2) In Atoll, right click on the “Antennas” folder in the Explorer Window and select “New”
in the context menu, as shown in the following figure.
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3) In the “Antennas New element properties” dialog box, the following tabs are available:
“General”, “Horizontal pattern”, “Vertical pattern” and “Other properties”.
4) In the “General” tab, the antenna gain and the electrical tilt can be defined.
Note: The electrical tilt value is only reference information for the user and this
value has no impact on the calculation. Antenna gain unit may be dBi or dBd. The
unit can be selected in the “Tools
Tools——Options
Options——Units
Units”” dialog box.
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5) Copy the two corresponding columns of horizontal pattern from

“LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document, and paste them into the “Co-Polar section” of
the “Horizontal pattern” tab in Atoll. After clicking Apply the pattern will display in the
right box as below.
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6) Do the same operation for the vertical pattern.
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Note: Atoll allows you to enter antenna pattern attenuations for as many as 720
angles. Therefore, attenuation values can also be defined for angles other than
359°°. For example
integer values from 0° to 359 example:: 0, 0.5, 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5 … 359, 359.5
359.5..
7) Other parameters can be set in the “Other properties” tab only for reference and have
no impact on the calculation.
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3.4.3 Transmitters parameters setting
1) Open the “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document and select the “Transmitters” sheet.
2) Double click on the “Transmitters” folder in “Explorer/Data” (or right click on

“Transmitters” and select “Open Table”) to open the “Transmitters” table, as shown in
the following figure.
3) After opening the “Transmitters” table in Atoll, you will discover that the number of
fields is larger than in the Excel file. It is because some of the parameters in Atoll
don't need the input from the user and Atoll will automatically fill with default values.
The fields listed in the Excel document are those necessary parameters for the
transmitters.
Before copy/paste the Excel table in Atoll, the unnecessary columns have to be hidden. If
the user try to paste the data which don’t match with the “Transmitters” tab, an error
message will be displayed.
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The following figure shows how to open “Columns to be displayed” tab, it also can be
accessed under “Format->Display columns”.
In the appeared “Columns to be displayed” tab, the unnecessary fields has to be

unchecked for hiding the corresponding column according to the fields in Excel, as shown
in the following chart. Finally the “Transmitters” tab and the Excel tab have exactly the
same columns.
4) Copy the transmitter’s data of the “Transmitters” sheet of the Excel document (except
the title line) and paste it in the “Transmitters” table in Atoll, as shown in the following
figure. Note the corresponding columns’ order. Column order could be changed by
dragging the title.
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5) After the import of data in the “Transmitters” table, the Map Window will be
automatically updated, without refresh or saving the document. The black arrowhead
represents the transmitter.
6) The toolbar’s button may zoom in or zoom out the Map Window (left click will
zoom in and right click will zoom out).
The toolbar’s button ， allows the user to choose one region to be zoomed in.
7) Pushing the toolbar’s button assigns automatically different colors for each
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transmitter in order to differentiate them.
8) Transmitter Parameters introduction

Transmitter’s parameters may be defined in the properties dialog box. For a new
transmitter there’re only two tabs: General and Transmitter as below. For a finished
transmitter it will display the other 3 tabs: Cells(described late), Propagation and
Display.
General tab:
Name: Transmitter name.
Site: select the donor site for the transmitter. Click on to check the property of
selected site.
Antenna Position: set antenna’s position. Relative to Site is offset value from Site
position. Coordinates is direct the Long/Lat of the antenna.
Transmitter tab:
Active: To activate a transmitter or not. Atoll automatically present red for active
transmitter under Transmitters folder and white for inactive transmitter. Only active
transmitters will be taken into account.
Transmitter Type: Intra-network (Server and Interferer) specify transmitter as Server
and Interferer. Inter-network (Interferer Only) specify transmitter as interferer from
external network. This feature allows user to simulate different existing network
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systems in a same region.

Transmission/Reception: Total noise and noise figure of the transmitter. Atoll will
calculate them according to specification of transmitter equipment defined by clicking
on as below:
In Equipment Specification dialog box, the gain and loss of selected equipment will be
use to initialize the total loss of the transmitter.
TMA: TMA equipment. Click on to define the noise figure, reception gain
and transmission loss with positive value.
Feeder: Feeder. Click on to define loss per meter, transmission and

reception loss of the connector with positive value.
BTS: Transmission and reception equipment. Click on to define noise DL

/UL loss for BTS and Rho factor. Rho factor represents the
self-interference of BTS. (.i.e the difference between input signal and
output signal) .
Feeder Length: Length of feeder.
Miscellaneous Losses: other losses for transmission and reception with positive
values.
The calculated loss and noise figure will be presented under Computed frame, they
also could be user-defined in the Real frame. The Real value has higher priority.
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Antenna：
Height/Ground: Antenna height above altitude. For antenna on building, this
value should include the height of the building.
Main Antenna: the selected antenna type. Click on to define the antenna’s
property.
Number of Antenna Ports: to set number of antenna ports for MIMO.
Secondary Antenna: Atoll allows user to define a secondary antenna to share the
transmitter power (% Power). For example, you may define
40% transmitter power for secondary antenna then remain
60% for the main antenna.）
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3.4.4 Cells parameters setting
1) Frequency Bands setting

Right click on Transmitters folder in “Explorer/Data” and select Network
Setting->Frequencies->Bands in the appeared context menu as below.
In the appeared Bands dialog box, Atoll allows user to define parameters as shown in the
following figure:
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2) Global Parameters Setting

Right click on Transmitters folder and select Properties, in Global Parameters tab of the
appeared dialog box, Atoll allows user to define Default Cyclic Prefix type,
PDCCH/PUCCH Overhead and Switching Point Periodicity in TDD schema.
Click on Advanced button to select the methods for DL Reference Signal EPRE, Serving
Cell Layer Selection and the Margin for UL power Adjustment.
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3) Open the “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document and select the “Cells” sheet.
4) To open the “Cells table”, right click on “Transmitters” in the “Explorer/Data” and
select “Cells->Open Table”, as seen in the following figure.
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5) Adjust the “Cells table” fields’ order according to the Excel fields, copy the data of the
“Cells” sheet and paste it the “Cells table” of Atoll, as shown in the following figure.
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In the “Cells” table the following parameters can be defined.
6) The “Name” field in the “Cells” table may be set according to the user preference. In
Atoll, the default name is set as: “Transmitter_name (0 ） ”, where “0” is the carrier
number.
7) Cells parameters description

In Atoll, Cell represents a channel/carrier and its property, so it’s possible for user to
configure a LTE network with multicarrier.
Under Cells tab in Transmitter’s property dialog box, the following parameters may be
defined:
Name: cell’s name.
Active: active or not. Only the active cell will be taken into account.
Layer: layer of cell, used for selecting service cell. After building a new cell, it will be
automatically allocated by Atoll, or manual modified.
Frequency Band: frequency band of cell, the options may be defined in Frequency
Band table.
Channel Number: channel number of cell, it should be consistent with the range (from
First channel to Last channel) defined in Frequency Band table.
Channel Allocation Status: Statue tag of the channel, used in AFP.
Not Allocated: the channel is neither manually nor automatically allocated. Atoll
considers “Not Allocated” channel changeable in AFP.
Allocated: the channel is manually or automatically allocated. Atoll considers
“Allocated” channel is changeable in AFP, but it won’t be changed
unless necessary.
Locked: the channel is manually or automatically allocated. Atoll considers
“Locked” channel is unchangeable in AFP.
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Physical Cell ID: Physical Cell ID from 3GPP specification, it must be an integer
between 0~503.
PSS ID: Primary synchronous serial, it must be 0, 1, or 2.
SSS ID: Secondary synchronous serial, it must be an integer between 0~167.
Physical Cell ID Status: Statue tag of PCI, used in PCI automatic allocation.
Not Allocated: the PCI is neither manually nor automatically allocated. Atoll
considers “Not Allocated” PCI is changeable in PCI automatic
allocation.
Allocated: the PCI is manually or automatically allocated. Atoll considers
“Allocated” PCI is changeable in PCI automatically allocation, but it
won’t be changed unless necessary.
Locked: the PCI is manually or automatically allocated. Atoll considers “Locked”
PCI is unchangeable in PCI automatic allocation.
Min Reuse Distance: the min distance to reuse the channel and PCI of the cell, used in
AFP and PCI automatic allocation.
Max Power: Max transmission power for single antenna of cell.
RS EPRE: EPRE of reference signal.
SS EPRE Offset/RS: energy offset between a synchronous signal RE and a reference
signal RE, used for calculating transmission power of
Primary/Secondary synchronous channel.
PBCH EPRE Offset/RS: energy offset between a PBCH RE and a reference signal RE,
used for calculating transmission power of PBCH.
PDCCH EPRE Offset/RS: energy offset between a PDCCH RE and a reference signal
RE, used for calculating transmission power of PDCCH.
PDSCH EPRE Offset/RS: energy offset between a PDSCH RE and a reference signal
RE, used for calculating transmission power of PDSCH.
Instantaneous Reference Signal Power: calculated by using max power, or RS EPRE
and EPRE offset.
Instantaneous SS Power: calculated by using max power, or RS EPRE and EPRE
offset.
Instantaneous PBCH Power: calculated by using max power, or RS EPRE and EPRE
offset.
Average PDCCH Power: calculated by using max power, or RS EPRE and EPRE
offset.
Average PDSCH Power: calculated by using max power, or RS EPRE and EPRE
offset.
Min RSRP: minimum RSRP threshold for a user to access the cell.
LTE Equipment: LTE equipment used by cell, the options may be defined in LTE
equipment table.
Scheduler: the scheduler arithmetic for carrier selection and resource allocation, the
options may be defined in Scheduler table.
Max Number of Users: max number of users which can access the cell, used in
simulation.
No. of Users (DL): number of user accessed on DL, it may be submitted form
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simulation result or user-defined.

No. of Users (UL): number of user accessed on UL, it may be submitted form
simulation result or user-defined.
TDD Frame Configuration: Frame configuration for TDD, the options depend on
Switching point periodicity being half-frame or full-frame.
Diversity Support (DL): antenna diversity type supported by cell on DL.
Diversity Support (UL): antenna diversity type supported by cell on UL.
AMS & MU-MIMO Threshold: for AMS, the required reference signal C/N threshold for
switching to MIMO in AMS; for MIMO user, the
minimum reference signal C/N threshold for using
MIMO.
MU-MIMO Capacity Gain: submitted from simulation result or user-defined. In UL
throughput coverage prediction, throughput on each pixel
using MU-MIMO will be multiplied by this gain.
Fractional Power Control Factor: used for compensating path loss in UL fractional
power control. For example, 0.8 means only 80%
of practical path loss will be considered in received
power prediction. Therefore, predictions on UL
received power from any terminals will be higher
than reality (100% path loss is used), the terminals
need to turn down the transmission power. This
factor presents as in 3GPP specification,
representing service cell’ s impact on terminal’s
fractional power.
Max PUSCH C/(I+N): used in UL fractional power control. Difference of Max PUSCH
C/(I+N) and UL noise rise corresponds to PUSCH nominal
power. PUSCH nominal power is a cell level parameter, limiting
the reduced transmission power of terminal, it presents as
PO_PUSCH in 3GPP specification.
Interference Coordination Support: ICIC type supported by cell, the option can be
Static DL or Static UL. In ICIC, only 1/3 of the
bandwidth will be used in ICIC fraction of the
frame according to the allocated PSS ID.
Therefore, fractional frequency planning can be
done by automatic PCI allocation.
ICIC Delta Path Loss Threshold: path loss difference between best server and second
best server.
Traffic Load (DL): DL traffic load proportion, submitted from simulation result or user
defined.
Max Traffic Load (DL): used in Monte Carlo simulation.
ICIC Ratio (DL): the ICIC ratio in DL traffic load. For instance, DL traffic load being
80% and ICIC being 50% means 40% DL traffic load in ICIC fraction
of the frame and the other 40% in non-ICIC fraction. This parameter
may be submitted from simulation result or user defined.
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Traffic Load (UL): DL traffic load proportion, submitted from simulation or user defined.
Max Traffic Load (UL): used in Monte Carlo simulation.
UL Noise Rise: overall UL noise rise including UL noise rise from inter-technology,
submitted from simulation result or user defined.
ICIC Noise Rise: UL noise rise in factional LTE frame bandwidth using segment
channel, only when ICIC is supported. This parameter may be
submitted from simulation result or user defined.
Max UL Noise Rise (not implemented): the limitation of UL Noise Rise and ICIC Noise
Rise used in Monte Carlo simulation. This
parameter presents the max interference
tolerance of cell on UL.
Inter-technology UL Noise Rise: presents the interference of base station and terminal
from external network, used for calculating
interference on UL in simulation, but not in
predictions, because Atoll calculates UL total noise
using UL interference noise including
Inter-technology UL Noise Rise.
Inter-technology DL Noise Rise: presents the impact on accessed terminal from
terminal of external network on DL, used for
calculating interference on DL in simulation.
Max Number of Intra-technology Neighbours: max number of intra-technology
neighbours.
Max Number of Inter-technology Neighbours: max number of inter-technology
neighbours.
Neighbours: click on the browsing button to open Neighbours dialog box to define the
relation between Max Number of Intra-technology Neighbours and Max
Number of Inter-technology Neighbours.
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3.4.5 Import and export of Access database
The standalone Atoll does not need to connect any external database, but it can be
convenient to import/export network data from/to a database.
3.4.5.1 Import Access database

1) Please find the “Brussels_LTE.mdb” document in the “\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects
and materials\Reference_Data\Access_Database” folder in the CDROM. This
document is an Access database file, containing the Brussels network data (but it
does not contain the map data).
2) In Atoll, select “File->New->From an Existing Database”, as shown in the following
figure.
3) In the browsing window select the “Brussels_LTE.mdb” document from the CDROM.
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4) After clicking on “Open”, Atoll automatically import all network data from the database
to the Atoll project.
5) Using “Centre in the Map Window” to let the sites appear in the center of the window.
Note: The database does not include the map data, therefore the map data has to be
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imported separately. Atoll allows the user to add custom field in database.
3.4.5.2 Export to Access database

When all network data have been set in Atoll, the data may be exported to a database file,
so that the network data can be easily shared and transferred.
Select Menu “File->Database->Export the Document to a New Database”, and in the

appeared “Export to a database” dialog box, type the file name and then export the project
data into the “.mdb” file.
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3.4.6 Add new sites
The steps for importing the network data into Atoll have been introduced above. Atoll also
provides another method to add new sites directly in the Map Window.
3.4.6.1 Add new sites one by one
Clicking on the Atoll toolbar button , turn the mouse into a honeycomb shape, as
In the Map Window, a new site (including 3 transmitters) can be added directly with a click
on the appropriate position. Simultaneously, Atoll adds the corresponding information into
the data sheets.
Press the “Ctrl” key to continuously lay sites in the Map Window. When the laying of sites
is finished, press the “Esc” key to withdraw from the current status.
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3.4.6.2 Add a group of sites
Click on the Atoll toolbar button , then a polygonal symbol will be added behind the
cursor.
Then draw a polygon in the Map Window to add a new group of sites inside the selected
region. Sites will be automatically laid inside the region with a certain inter-site distance,
as seen in the following figure.
After drawing the polygon, the following figure will appear.
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Similarly, Atoll will add the corresponding information to the new sites into the data sheets.
If the user wants to delete a group of sites, it can be done in the “Site” table as explain
above or more quickly through the following operations:
Right click on a group of the “Hexagonal Design” folder and select “Delete”, then the entire
group of sites will be deleted.
3.4.6.3 Template management

In the previous sections, a new group of sites have been added by selecting a template
and by drawing a polygon. Atoll allows the user to choose among different templates and
to edit a specific template.
The templates are available in the Atoll toolbar, as shown in the following figure.
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Choosing “Manage Templates” in bottom will open the “Station Template Properties”
dialog box.
The user can edit the template’s parameters by clicking on “Properties” button. The user
may also add a new template or delete an existing one.
In the appeared dialog box, the template’s properties (for example, the number of sectors,
the antenna model, the azimuth, the tilt, the height and so on) can be edited.
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3.4.7 MIMO Setting

Atoll allows users setting parameters related to MIMO according to their requirement to
simulate MIMO technology including STTD, SU-MIMO, AMS and MU-MIMO (only for UL).
See below the operations:
1) Right click on Transmitter folder in “Explorer/Data” and select Equipment -> LTE
Equipment from the context menu.
Double click on Default Cell Equipment and Default UE Equipment to open the properties
dialog box.
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In the appeared dialog select MIMO tab to set the number of reception/transmission
antennas, the corresponding MIMO gain (Diversity Gain for STTD, Max MIMO Gain for
SU-MIMO), and Mobility etc, as seen in below figure.
2) Right click on Transmitter folder in “Explorer/Data” and select Open Table to set the
number of reception/transmission antennas for MIMO transmitter as seen in below
figure.
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3) In Explorer/Data select LTE Parameters ->Terminals to set Antenna Diversity Support

as MIMO for terminal using MIMO, to select a LTE equipment and set the number of
reception/transmission antennas, as seen in below figure.
4) Right click on Transmitter folder in “Explorer/Data” and select Equipment -> Cells to
set UL/DL diversity support types for cell using MIMO, the diversity support type may
be Transmit Diversity, SU-MIMO or AMS for DL and Receive Diversity, SU-MIMO,
AMS or MU-MIMO for UL. If AMS or MU-MIMO (for UL) is selected, the AMS &
MU-MIMO Threshold should be set. MU-MIMO Capacity Gain presents UL capacity
rise due to MU-MIMO.
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5) Define MIMO gain based on clutter classes in Clutter Classes map properties.
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3.4.8 ICIC Setting

1) Cells with ICIC have to use the same Channel Number.
2) Select ICIC for Interference Coordination Support.
3) Set ICIC Delta Path Loss Threshold. If the difference between best server and
second server is lower than this threshold, then ICIC will be launched.
4) Manually or automatically allocate Physical Cell ID. In ICIC, to use which fraction of
the bandwidth depends on PSS ID allocated in PCI allocation.
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3.5 Propagation model

Atoll integrates many propagation models including Okuruma-Hata, Cost-Hata, SPM
(Standard Propagation Model), ITU370, ITU526, ITU 529, Longley-Rice,
Erceg-Greenstein (SUI), Sakagami Extended (3.5 GHz) and WLL models.
Okumura-Hata, Cost-Hata and SPM models are the most commonly used models and
can be calibrated using CW measurements through an automatic calibration wizard.
3.5.1 SPM propagation model
SPM (Standard Propagation Model) is a model originating from Planet and using K
parameters. The SPM model has also a relation with the Hata model. The SPM model
may be calibrated with CW measurements.
3.5.1.1 Import of CW measurement

measurementss
Note: the CW measurements used by this document are just for the purpose of
helping the user to be familiar with the use of the software. The detailed
requirements for CW measurements (including data quantity) are described in the
SPM model calibration document, which can be provided upon request.
To import the measurements, there are 2 methods: Copy/Paste and import.

1) Copy/Paste method
(1) Open the “Site89_2 survey” worksheet in the “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls”
document. This worksheet provides the measurements corresponding to the
“Site89_2” cell with the longitude, the latitude and the received signal level for
each sampling point
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(2) In Atoll, right click on the “CW measurements” folder in the “Explorer\Data”
window, and select “New” in the context menu, as shown in the following
figure.
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(3) In “New CW measurement path” dialog box, fill in the file name, the
corresponding transmitter, the receiver height. Then paste the Excel table data
into the table, as shown in the following figure.
Note: Set the coordinate system with “WGS84 WGS84”” corresponding to the projection
system use in the Excel tab.
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After clicking on “OK”, the test data are immediately displayed on the Map Window. Each
point represents a measurement sampling.
2) Import method
(1) Atoll supports the formats .dat, .txt, .csv and .hd (PlaNET)
(2) Please find 3 .txt documents inside the “Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and
materials\Reference_Data\Measurement_Surveys” folder of the CDROM
(3) In Atoll, right click on “CW measurements” in the “Explorer\Data” window and
select “Import” as shown in the following figure
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(4) In the appeared “Open” dialog box, browse for the document to be imported.
Atoll supports the multi selection of files. Several measurements
corresponding to the same transmitter can be imported at the same time, but if
the measurements belong to different transmitters, then each measurement
has to be imported separately.
Provided test data corresponding to different transmitters, the measurements have to be
imported one by one.
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(5) The appeared dialog box contains two tabs, “General” and “Setup”. In the
“General” tab, define the corresponding reference transmitter, the frequency
and receiver height, as shown in the following figure.
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(6) In the “Setup” tab, fill in the “1st Measurement Row” field with 2 (because the
drive test document has a title line and the data start at the second line). Then
click on the “Setup” button.
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(7) After clicking on the “Setup” button, the “CW Measurement Setup” dialog box
appears, as shown in the following figure. Define “X-Coordinates” and
“Y-Coordinates” fields with respectively the longitude and latitude.
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(8) Click on the “Import” button in the import main window and then the
measurement data will be imported into the project. After the import, the
measurement data will be automatically put in the “CW measurements” folder
of the Explorer Window. Use “Centre in the Map Window” function to display
the imported measurements in the center of the map.
Import also the “Measures_Site69_2_street.txt” and the “Measures_Site69_3_street.txt”

documents into the project by the similar operations above. Please note that the 3
measurements files correspond to different transmitters.
(9) Setting of the CW measurements display — — double click on the “CW

measurement” folder and open the “CW measurements properties” dialog box.
In the “Display” tab, define the “Display type” as “Value Intervals” and “Field”
as “M(dBm)”.
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(10) Before module calibration, the unclear CW measurement need to be filtered.

Double click on CW Measurement folder and select Filtering Assistance… or
Filtering Zone.
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Select Filtering Zone to draw a filtering zone on the map to filter CW points
outside the zone; Select Filtering Assistance… to filter CW points basin go
custom rules, like distance, angle and clutter etc, as seen in below figure:
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3.5.1.2 Automatic calibration of the SPM model

A good propagation model calibration requires having enough data, filtering them and
carrying a careful tuning of each factor of the model. The tuning steps are quite complex,
which is not described in details in this document. A document of specific SPM model
calibration can be provided upon request.
Below the SPM model basic operations are introduced.
The SPM automatic calibration wizard may help the user to find the best K parameters,
the “Effective antenna height” method, the “Diffraction” method and the clutter losses.
(1) Duplicate the existing standard propagation model and make the calibration
for the duplicated model. This method has the advantage to preserve the
existing model and to allow a calibration of the SPM for each kind of
environments.
(2) Right click on the duplicated SPM model and select “Automatic Calibration”.
Select the CW measurement(s) and click on the “Next” button.
(3) In the appeared dialog box, select the K parameters that will be used for the
calibration. It is recommended not to select the K6 and K7 parameter.
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Double click on a K parameter or select a K parameter and click on “Define Range”, will
open the “Define Domain” dialog box, where the range of the K parameter can be defined,
as shown in the following figure. But generally it is recommended to keep the default
values defined above.
After choosing the range, click on “OK”.
(4) According to the selected CW measurements and the tuning parameters, Atoll
calibrates automatically the SPM propagation model.
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(5) After the computation, Atoll provides in the same dialog box the results and the
statistics concerning the model, as the average error and the standard
deviation. According to the results, the user may choose to commit the K
parameters list by clicking on the “Commit” button.
Note: the automatic model calibration is only a mathematical computation method.

The result depends on the quality of the CW measurements. Therefore a high
quality of CW measurements is required.
(6) If the results are not satisfactory and the K parameters have been already
committed, the propagation model can be deleted by right clicking on it and
selecting “Delete” (or by pressing the “Delete” key on the keyboard).
(7) If after the calibration, the model has to be used in other projects, copy it by
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with CTRL+C and paste it with CTRL+V in the “Modules” tab of another
project.
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3.5.1.3 Model validation with CW measurements

Normally, the validity of the model is checked with the standard deviation. The lower the
value is, the better the model is. Generally, the standard deviation has to be less than 8dB.
Another method is using the analysis tool to compare each measurement point to the
associated prediction.
1) Right click on the CW measurement in the “Explorer\ Data” window. Then select
“Properties” in the context menu.
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2) On the appeared properties dialog box, select the calibrated propagation model and
click on “OK”.
3) Right click on the CW measurement and select “Refresh Geo Data”.
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4) Afterward right click on the CW measurement and select the “Calculations->

Calculate Signal Levels” function.
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5) So the selected propagation model will be used. Right click on the CW measurement
and select “Display Statistics”. Atoll will display the statistics report and the standard
deviation of the measurement is available.
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6) Right click on the CW measurement and select “Open the Analysis Tool”.
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Atoll displays automatically the “CW measurements” window, as shown in the following
figure. With the cursor clicking in the “CW measurements” window and Atoll will
simultaneously represent the drive test position in the Map Window. For the selected point
Atoll provides the measurement value (M) and the predicted value (P). On the right of the
“CW measurements” window the user can add an additional result, as the difference
between M and P.
The calibration process above is also applied for other propagation module such as
Cost-Hata.
Note: For the document with the detailed model calibration operations, please
contact Atoll support team.
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3.5.1.4 Set the propagation model for each transmitter

After the calibration of the propagation model, open the “Transmitters” tab and select the
propagation model in pull-down menu of the “Main propagation model” field. The user may
use Ctrl + D.
If all transmitters use the same propagation model, then the quickest way is to define the
model in the “Transmitters properties” dialog box. In the “Propagation” tab, select the
propagation model and choose the radius and the resolution (Normally the resolution is
the same as the digital map).
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3.5.2 Cost-Hata model
Okuruma-Hata and Cost-Hata use both the standard Hata formula. The Okuruma-Hata is
suitable for a frequency smaller than 1500MHz and Cost-Hata is suitable for a frequency
bigger than 1500MHz.
Both Okuruma-Hata and Cost-Hata can be calibrated. The following paragraph introduces
only the calibration of the Cost-Hata model, but the calibration of the Okuruma-Hata
model is similar.
3.5.2.1 Import of CW measurements

Please refer to the paragraph 3.5.1.1.
3.5.2.2 Automatic calibration of the Cost-Hata model

The following paragraph does not make an exhaustive introduction of the automatic
calibration of the Cost-Hata model. Automatic calibration is quite complex because of the
detailed adjustment steps. Please contact the Atoll Support Team for detailed document.
Firstly, the CW measurements must be in a sufficient number and of good quality, in order
to calibrate accurately the Cost-Hata model.
The Cost-Hata calibration tool might help the user to find the best A1, B1, Diffraction
Factor and Formula Correction for each type of clutter.
1) Right click the Cost-Hata model and select “Duplicate” will duplicate the Cost-Hata
model. So, the calibration will not affect the parameters of the existing Cost-Hata
model.
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2) Double click on Cost-Hata to open the properties box, in Formulas assigned to

Clutter Classes section, user may select a clutter formula for each clutter or use the
default formulas.
Click on Formulas…button to check the formulas, each parameter of each formula may be
user defined.
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3) Right clicking on the folder “Copy of Cost-Hata” and select “Calibration” will open the
calibration wizard. Select one or several CW measurement(s) and click “Next”, as
4) In the appeared dialogue select the parameters that Atoll need to calibrate and click
“Next”, as shown in the following figure.
5) Atoll automatically calibrates the Cost-Hata model and displays the parameters
before and after the calibration. Atoll provides also the root mean square, the
average and the standard deviation of parameters before and after the calibration.
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According to the results the user can choose to commit the result by clicking on the
“Commit” button.
6) If a propagation model is not useful, it’s easy to delete it by right clicking on the
Cost-Hata model and select “Delete” or use the “Delete” key on the keyboard.
7) If the user wants to use the propagation model in another Atoll project, just copy the
existing propagation model with CTRL+C and then paste it in the new project with
CTRL+V.
3.5.2.3 Set the propagation model for each transmitter

After the calibration of the propagation model, open the “Transmitters” tab and select the
propagation model in pull-down menu of the “Main propagation model” field. The user may
use Ctrl + D.
If all transmitters use the same propagation model, then the quickest way is to define the
model in the “Transmitters properties” dialog box. In the “Propagation” tab, select the
calibrated Cost-Hata module and choose the radius and the resolution (Normally the
resolution is the same as the digital map).
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3.6 Propagation matrix calculation
3.6.1 Preliminary work
Before launching the calculation of the path loss matrices, the following preliminary work
has to be done.
3.6.1.1 Resolution of predictions and receiver altitude
The user needs also to set the resolution for coverage studies. This resolution may be
equal or lower than the map’s accuracy. The higher the resolution is, the longer the
processing time is.
1) Right click on the “Predictions” folder of the “Explorer/ Data” window and select
“Properties” (or double click directly on the “Prediction” folder).
2) In the “Predictions properties” dialog box, set the “Default resolution” value to 20m
(this will be the resolution for the following prediction studies). Clicking on “Private
Directory” allows the user to select the directory of pathloss document, which will be
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used to store the pathloss matrices. The user can either select the “Embedded”
option to store the pathloss matrices in the current Atoll project, or select the
“.\xxxxx.losses” option to store the pathloss matrices in the external “.losses” folder
which in the same directory of the ATL file, or use the “Browse” option to select a
folder to store the pathloss matrices externally.
3) In the “Predictions properties” dialog box”, select the “Receiver” tab and set 1.5m
for the receiver altitude (Height of handset).
3.6.1.2 Setting the Computation Zone

If there is no computation zone defined, the pathloss matrices for all transmitters will be
calculated, based on the calculation radius and the signal threshold.
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If the user wants to calculate the pathloss matrices only for a specific region, a
Computation Zone can either be imported or directly drawn in the Map Window.
1) Drawing the Computation Zone

(1) Right click on “Computation Zone” in the “Geo” tab of Explorer Window and
select “Draw” in the context menu.
(2) Then draw a polygon with the mouse to delimitate the region, for which the
propagation will be calculated.
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2) Import of the Computation Zone

(1) Right click on “Computation Zone” in the “Geo” tab of the Explorer Window
and select “Import” in the context menu.
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(2) In the appeared dialog box, browse for the “\ Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and
materials\Reference_Data\Computation_Zone” folder in the CDROM and
open the “Brussels_Computation_Zone.mif” document.
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(3) After opening the document, the “Vector import” dialog box will appear, as
shown in the following figure. Press the “Import” button to import the
computation zone.
(4) After the import, the computation zone will appear in red, as seen in the
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following figure.
(5) Right click on “Computation Zone” in the “Geo” tab and select “Export”. Then
export the computation zone with .MIF, .agd (Atoll map format) or .shp format.
This computation zone can be imported in other projects.
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3.6.2 Propagation and prediction studies calculation
The calculations in Atoll are divided in two parts, pathloss matrices calculation and
prediction study calculations.
calculation::
Propagation calculation
Calculate the propagation loss on the link between each transmitter and each
pixel. The calculation results will be saved in the path loss matrices. The pixel
size is the transmitter calculation resolution.
Coverage study prediction
Atoll reads the data from the pathloss matrices, which was calculated
previously, and make a post processing to calculate and display the coverage
study.
If the pathloss matrices have been calculated and there is no modification on the RF
parameters (e.g. the site location, the antenna model, the azimuth and so on), Atoll does
not automatically recalculate the pathloss matrices. If some of the RF parameters of some
transmitters are changed, Atoll will recalculate the pathloss matrices for these
transmitters.
Right click on the folder “Predictions” in the “Explorer/ Data” tab and select “New”, as
In the appeared “Study Types” dialog box, Atoll provides by default 13 types of predictions.
The first 5 studies are concerning LTE pilot 、 traffic power without considering the load
conditions, so these predictions can be done before the Monte Carlo simulation.
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3.6.2.1 Best server prediction

1) Select “Coverage by Transmitters” and click “OK” to open the “Coverage by
Transmitter properties” dialog box. In the “General” tab, the “Resolution” of the
prediction can be set.
2) In the “Condition” tab, set the “Signal level” threshold (for example -120dBm) and
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select “Best Signal Level” in the Server’s field. With a margin field may be set as 0
signifying there’s no overlap between best server areas.
The default value for the Cell Edge Coverage Probability is 75%. If the standard deviation
is set in the Clutter Classes properties, Atoll will use this value to calculate the Shadowing
Margin. Atoll supports Cell Edge Coverage Probability lower than 50%. Atoll considers
indoor loss in predictions which is read from the properties of Clutter Classes.
3) In the “Display” tab, define the display attributes, such as coverage transparency and
so on.
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4) Click on the “OK” button to close the dialog box. Clicking on the toolbar button
(or F7 on the keyboard), Atoll starts the computation and open automatically the
“Event viewer” window, which shows the prediction calculation progress.
If the “Propagation calculation” is already calculated, Atoll will start the computation of the
coverage study.
Each prediction study is stored automatically in the “Prediction” folder of the “Explorer/
Data” window, the generated prediction are shown in the following figure.
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The generated prediction study is locked automatically. So if any parameters are changed
this prediction study result will not be changed.
If the prediction study has to be recomputed, right click on this prediction study and unlock
the study before starting the computation.
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3.6.2.2 Coverage by Signal Level prediction

1) In the “Study Type” dialog box select “Coverage by Signal Level’.
2) In the “Condition” tab, fill in -105dBm for the signal level threshold and select “All” for
the Server’s field.
3) In the “Display” tab, the user can set the display attributes, such as the intervals for
the predicted values, the color and so on. The Min and Max values and the colors
can be set by clicking on “Actions->Shading…”.
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4) After defining the properties, similarly as for the “Best Server prediction”, click on the
toolbar button (or on the keyboard F7), to start the computation.
Note: Previously Atoll already calculated the pathloss matrices with the “Coverage
transmitters”” prediction. For the “Signal Level
by transmitters Level”” prediction, there is no change of
RF parameters, so this time Atoll calculates only the prediction.
5) The prediction of the coverage by signal level is represented in the following figure.
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6) Selecting “View->Legend Window”, displays the legend in the Map Window.
3.6.2.3 Overlapping Zones prediction

1) Select “Overlapping Zones” in the “Study Type” dialog box.
2) In the “Condition” tab, set the signal level threshold to -105dBm, select “Best Signal
Level” for the server field and set the “Margin” to 4dB.
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3) The coverage map is shown in the following figure.
“Number of servers >=2” represents the region where the received signal level from
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different pilots have a difference less than 4dB.

“Number of servers >=3” represents the region where the received signal level of 3
different pilots have a difference less than 4dB, and so on.
3.6.2.4 Force calculation

If there is no change in the RF parameters, Atoll won’t recalculate the pathloss matrices
before calculating a prediction. But Atoll also provides the “Force Calculation” function,
which can force the calculation of the pathloss for all transmitters.
Click on the toolbar button to force the recalculation of all path loss matrices.
3.6.2.5 Prediction template management

If the prediction default values don’t match the user’s need, Atoll allows the user to save a
prediction template in order to store the parameters setting.
1) Right click on a prediction study and choose “Save as a Customised Study”.
2) A “Save as” dialogue window will prompt up. Define the name and the path of the
XML file you would like to save, as shown in the below figure. By default, the storage
path is the installation folder of Atoll.
3) The prediction template will be added in the “Study type” dialog box.
4) If you want to delete this template, select it and click “delete” button.
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3.7 Automatic Neighbours Allocation

Neighbours
Atoll allows the user to fill the neighbours table or add the neighbours manually or allocate
the neighbours automatically.
3.7.1 Manually Allocation Feature

1) Right click on the “Transmitters” folder in the “Explorer/ Data” window and select
“Cells-> Neighbours-> Intra Technology Neighbours”.
2) In the appeared table, fill with the neighbours list.
3) Click on the toolbar icon and the select one transmitter on the Map Window.
The neighboring relations of this transmitter will be displayed graphically, as shown in
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3.7.2 Automatically Allocation Feature

1) Right click on the “Transmitters” folder in the “Explorer/ Data” window and select
“Cells-> Neighbours-> Automatically Allocation…”.
2) In the appeared “Automatic Neighbour Allocation” dialog box define the properties
and then start the automatic allocation by clicking on the “Run” button.
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3) The automatic allocation results will be displayed in the same dialog box. According
to the results, the user may choose to commit the automatic neighbour allocation list
by clicking on the “Commit” button.
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4) Click on the toolbar icon and the select one transmitter on the Map Window.
The neighboring relations of this transmitter will be displayed graphically, as shown in
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Display the “Coverage by transmitters” prediction. New neighbour relation can be added
or removed graphically by pressing the “CTRL” key and left clicking on a “Best Server”
area.
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3.8 Frequency Allocation

Atoll supports frequency allocation plan manually input by the users, or automatically
allocated by Automatic Allocation tool.
3.8.1 Manual Frequency Allocation

Right click on the “Transmitters” folder in the “Explorer/ Data” window and select “Cells->
Open table”, input the channel number in the Channel Number column as below.
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3.8.2 Automatic Frequency Allocation

Right click on the “Transmitters” folder in the “Explorer/ Data” window and select
“Cells->Frequency Plan->Automatic Allocation”.
In the appeared dialog box define the conditions and limits during the allocation.
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For Interference Matrices section, user may input a Quality Margin directly, or click on
Calculate button to calculate the interference matrices between each cells, check the Take
into Account after calculating.
Click on Calculate button in the bottom of dialog box to start the frequency allocation. The
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allocation result will displayed in the same dialog box, the result could be committed to
the cells table by clicking on Commit button.
Open the Cells table to check the updated Channel Number, the Channel Allocation
Status will be automatically changed to Allocated.
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3.9 Physical Cell ID Allocation

Atoll supports Physical Cell ID manually input by the users, or automatically allocated by
Automatic Allocation tool.
3.9.1 Manual PCI Allocation

“Cells->Open Table”, input the PCI in the Physical Cell ID column as below.
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3.9.2 Automatic PCI Allocation

“Cells->Physical Cell IDs->Automatic Allocation”.
In the appeared dialog box define the conditions and limits during the allocation. Click on
Calculate button in the bottom of dialog box to start the PCI allocation. The allocation
result will displayed in the same dialog box, the result could be committed to the cells table
by clicking on Commit button.
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3.10 Simulations
3.10.1 Traffic model
In the LTE Parameters of the “Explorer/ Data” window user may define The LTE traffic
model including: “Environments”, “User profiles”, “Terminals”, “Mobility Types” and
“Services”.
Services Type
Mobility Type
Terminals Type
User Profiles
Environments
3.10.1.1 Services
1) By default, Atoll provides 4 kinds of service types. Double clicking on the “VoIP” type
will open the “VoIP properties” dialog box.
2) In General tab set the UL/DL Activity factor and the Priority.
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3.10.1.2 Mobility types

Atoll provides by default 4 Mobility Types (the name depends of the speed). Double
clicking on the “Pedestrian” mobility opens the “Pedestrian properties” dialog box. The
Mobility types are used to select the bearer and MIMO gain.
3.10.1.3 Terminals
1) Atoll provides 2 kinds of Terminals by default. Double click on “MIMO Terminal” and
open the “MIMO Terminal” properties dialog box.
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2) Atoll allows the user to build a new terminal type by right clicking on Terminals folder
and selecting New in the context menu to input the related parameters.
3.10.1.4 User profile

1) Atoll provides by default 2 kinds of user profiles. Double click one “Business User” to
open the open the “Business User properties” dialog box.
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2) In the “General” tab, for CS service such as Voice define the associated Terminal, the
Calls/Hours and the Duration; for PS service such as Message define the associated
Terminal, the Calls/hour and the DL/UL Volume(Kbytes)
3) Atoll allows the user to build a new user profile type by right clicking on User profile
folder and selecting New in the context menu to input the related parameters.
3.10.1.5 Environments
1) Atoll provides by default 4 kinds of Environments (classify by clutter name). Double
click on “Dense Urban” and open the “Dense Urban properties” dialog box.
2) In the “General” tab. For each kind of “User type”, fill in the corresponding “Mobility”
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and “Density” fields.

3) In the “Clutter Weighting” tab, the user can specify a weight and an indoor
percentage for each clutter class. The higher the weight is, the higher the user
density is. If the weight is 0 for a specific clutter, then no user will be distributed on
this clutter.
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3.10.2 Creating Traffic Maps
Atoll provides 3 different types of methods (10 methods in all) to create the traffic maps.
1, User profiles traffic map
（1） User profile environments
（2） User profile densities
2, Traffic maps per sector
（1） Throughputs in uplink and downlink
（2） Total number of users (all activity statuses)
（3） Number of users per activity status
3, Traffic maps per user density (No. Users/km2)
（1） All activity statuses
（2） Active in uplink and downlink
（3） Active in uplink
（4） Active in downlink
（5） Inactive
Right click on “Traffic” in the “Explorer/ Geo” tab and select “New map”, as seen in the
following figure.
In the appeared “New traffic Map” dialog box, the above 3 types of methods for traffic map
creation can be selected, as shown in the following figure.
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In the following paragraphs, 3 methods for traffic map creation will be introduced with the
reference data from “\Reference_Data\Traffic_Data” in the CDROM.
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3.10.2.1 User profile environments

This kind of traffic map can be drawn manually or imported from external files.
1) Draw manually
(1) In the “New Traffic Map” dialog box, select “User profile environments” and
click on “Create Map”
(2) Atoll will display the “Environment map editor” on the top of the Map Window.
(3) In the “Environment map editor”, the user can choose one kind of environment,
like “Suburban”
(4) Then click on the button to draw a polygon in the desired area
corresponding to a “Suburban” environment, as shown in the following figure.
(5) With the same method draw the “Dense Urban” zone.
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(6) If the drawing polygon is not good, it can be deleted with the button.
2) Import a traffic map

In the “\Reference_Data\Traffic_Data \ Raster_Traffic” folder of the CDROM, a traffic map
is prepared. It is the same map as the clutter map.
Note: The clutter map can be used as a traffic map, especially for complex
environments, because it is difficult to draw manually this kind of map.
(1) Select “User profile environments” in the “Create a traffic map” dialog box and
then click on the “Import a file” button.
(2) In the appeared dialog box, select the “Reference data\Traffic data\
Raster_Traffic\ Brussels_Raster_Traffic.bil” in the CDROM and import it.
(3) Atoll will automatically open the “Environment map properties” dialog box
where the user can define the display color, the legend and the code for each
environment. In Description tab, select the Environment (Name) for each
clutter classes(Code). Click on to move the unavailable code in

the map.
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3) Export a traffic map

A traffic map can be exported from the Atoll document.
Right click on the “Environment map” folder and select “Save As” to export the traffic map.
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3.10.2.2 User profile densities

This kind of traffic map may also be drawn manually or imported from external files.
The drawing method is the same as the method introduced for the traffic map “User profile
environments”. In the following part, the method for importing a traffic map from the
CDROM is introduced.
1) Select “User profile densities” in the “Create a traffic map” dialog box and then click
on the “Import a file” button.
2) In the appeared dialog box, select the “\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and
materials\Reference_Data\Traffic_Data\Vector_Traffic\Airport\Airport_Building.MIF”
file from the CDROM and import it.
3) In the appeared dialog box, select the “Traffic” tab to define the indoor percentage
and the weight for each clutter.
4) Import with the same method the other vector traffic maps located in the “\Atoll 282
LTE demo projects and materials\Reference_Data\Traffic_Data\Vector_Traffic” folder.
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3.10.2.3 Sector traffic map

Traffic map per sector can be either generated by input data manually or imported from
external files. Before generating this kind of traffic map, the Coverage by transmitters
prediction must be made.
As shown in the following figure, the input parameters for each serving cell and each
service can be:
� throughputs in uplink and downlink
� total number of users (all activity statuses)
� number of users per activity status
The following paragraphs will introduce the manual input of data and the import of traffic
map for the first traffic map per sector, but the procedure is the same for the “total number
of users (all activity statuses)” and “number of users per activity status” traffic maps.
1) Input the data manually

(1) Copy the “LTE_Traffic(Throughput)_Per_Sector.xls” traffic map located in the
“\Atoll 282 LTE demo projects and
materials\Reference_Data\Traffic_Data\Cell_Traffic” folder (except for .the title
line) of the CDROM.
(2) Select “Throughputs in uplink and downlink” in the “Create a traffic map” dialog
box and then click on the “Create Map” button.
(3) In the appeared “Map per sector” dialog box paste the traffic values, as shown
in the following figure.
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(4) After clicking OK, the traffic map properties dialog box will automatically
appear. In the traffic tab, fill in the percentage of each type of Terminal, the
percentage of each type of Mobility, the percentage of Indoor users and clutter
weight per clutter class.
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(5) After clicking on the “OK” button, the traffic map will be loaded on the Map
Window. Each best server zone defined by “The Coverage by Transmitter”
prediction will have a traffic distributed.
2) Import of traffic map

(1) Select “Throughput in uplink and downlink” in the “Traffic map per sector” part
of the “Create a traffic map” dialog box and then click on the “Import a file”
button.
(2) In the appeared dialog box, select the “Reference_Data\Traffic_data\
Cell_Traffic\ Live_Traffic.agd” from the CDROM and import it.
(3) In the appeared dialog box, define the traffic parameters in the Traffic tab.
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3.10.2.4 User density traffic map (no. of user/km2)

User density traffic map can be either generated by input data manually or imported from
external files.
User density traffic map provides the number of connected users per unit surface, i.e., the
density of users, as input. It can be either the density of users per activity status or the
density of users including all activity statuses. Atoll provides the following type of traffic
map per user density:
� All Activity Statuses
� Active in Uplink:
� Active in Downlink
� Active in Uplink and Downlink
� Inactive
Right click on “Traffic” in the “Explorer/ Geo” tab, select “New Map”. In the appeared dialog
box select “User density traffic map” with “All activity statuses” and then click on the
“Create Map” button. The “User density traffic map properties” window will appear, as
Then define the distributions for Terminals, Mobilities, Services and Clutter. In the
“Display” tab, the color of the traffic map can be defined.
After clicking OK, a Map per density of users 1 will be added under Traffic folder in
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Geo/Explorer. Right click on it and select “Edit”, the vector editor function will be activated
and then the "New Polygon” feature can be used for drawing a new Traffic region in the
Map Window.
The drawing method is the same as Based on environments per user profiles.
The original density is 0, double click on the Traffic region and in the appeared dialog box
define the corresponding Traffic Density.
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3.10.3 Subscriber list

In LTE project, user may generate a Subscriber list for fixed users used in Monte Carlo
simulation.
Atoll provides two methods to generate Subscriber list:
1． Input a Subscriber list
Right click on Subscribers in Data/Explorer and select “New List…” in the context menu.
In the appeared Subscriber list properties dialog box input the name of the Subscriber list,
like Subscriber List 0 as below, then click OK.
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The cursor will automatically turn into a , left click on the map to add a fixed
subscriber as shown in below figure.
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When the add is finished, press ESC to quit adding status. Right click on Subscriber List0
under Subscribers folder in Data/Explorer and select Open Table to check the positions of
added points.
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2． Import a Subscriber List

Atoll allows the user to import Subscriber List with txt and CSV format. The provided
Subscriber data in CDROM is with XY coordinate, select Tools->Options in the menu bar
and change the Display system to XY coordinate as below:
Right click on Subscribers folder in Explorer\ Data and select Import in the context menu，
browse “Reference_Data\Subscriber_List.txt” in the CDROM and import it.
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In the appeared Import window, click on Import button in the below left.
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3． Calculate Subscriber List

In Explorer -> Data -> Subscribers folder, right click on the Subscriber list which needs to
calculate and select Calculations->Automatic Server Allocation.
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In the appeared Subscriber List properties dialog box check the Shadowing taken into
account box and fill the Cell Edge Coverage Probability, click on Calculation button then.
In Event Viewer user may check the calculation process, the calculation is not basing on
path loss matrices. Atoll uses the location and height of each Subscriber to calculate the
path loss, receiver power and other outputs.
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3.10.4 Run a Simulation
After the establishment of traffic map or subscribers list, the Monte Carlo simulation can
be calculated.
1) Open the “Cells” table and define the upper limits for downlink and uplink traffic loads
for cells.
Note: Using these limits, it is possible to model additional constraints in Monte
Carlo simulations, i.e., resource saturation can occur when the user-defined cell
capacity limit is achieved.
2) Right click on the “LTE Simulations” folder in the “Explorer/ Data” window and select
“New”.
3) In the appeared dialog box, set the “Number of Simulations”, “the Max DL/UL Traffic
Load”(global value or value per cell)
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4) In the “Source Traffic” tab, select the traffic map or the subscribers list which will be
used for the simulation.
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5) In the “Advanced” tab choose the conditions of convergence.
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6) After clicking on “OK”, the simulation starts immediately.

The simulation process will be displayed in the “Event viewer” window.
7) The simulation results are available in the LTE simulations folder. Double clicking on
a simulation opens the simulation properties dialog box with the simulation report.
The simulation report is composed with 5 tabs, “Statistics”, “Sites”, “Cells”,
“Mobiles”, and “Initial Conditions”.
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8) Commit the results.

The Uplink and Downlink cell loads of each cell are calculated in Monte Carlo simulations
and the results can be committed in the Cells tab.
To commit the result of a single simulation, click on the “Commit Results” button in above
Cells tab, the simulation results (DL Traffic Load、UL Traffic Load、UL Noise Rise、ICIC
Ratio、ICIC UL Noise Rise) will be committed to Cells table.
Right click on a group of simulations and select “Average Simulation” in the context menu
to open the average simulation report. Click on the “Commit Result” button in the Cells tab
to commit the cell loads into the Cells table. These values will be used in the prediction
studies introduced in the next section.
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3.11 Point Analysis function

Atoll provides a point analysis window to analyze the network performance.
Clicking on the toolbar icon or selecting “View->Point analysis”, opens the analysis
window. The cursor turns into a circle representing the receiver. Put the receiver on the
Map Window, as shown in the following figure.
3.11.1 Profile
In the “Profile” tab, the user may analyze the terrain profile between the transmitter and
the receiver, the received signal level, the link budget and other information.
The desired transmitter (for the profile analysis) can be selected in the “Profile” window or
directly on the map. Atoll automatically displays the terrain profile between the selected
transmitter and the receiver.
In the “Profile” tab, the point to point signal power is real-time calculated.
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Right clicking on the “Profile” tab and selecting “Link budget” to open the “Link Budget”
window, with the information about the link budget between the transmitter and the
receiver.
3.11.2 Reception
In the “Reception” tab, the received signal level values for the strongest transmitters are
given with bars, link between receiver and these transmitters shows on the Map window.
The received power values are calculated according to the stored path loss matrices.
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Double clicking on Reference Signals, Downlink and Uplink in the right box to check
corresponding detailed information, below figure are an example for Downlink.
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3.11.3 Interference
In the “Interference” tab, user may analyze the noises around the location of the receiver..
3.11.4 Results
The “Results” tab gives the received power for all cells, as seen in the following figure.
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3.12 Other prediction studies

In the 3.6 section, 13 kinds of coverage prediction studies were introduced. The following
10 prediction studies need uplink and downlink load conditions, which may be either
obtained from a Monte Carlo simulation or set manually.
The following coverage of C/(I+N) (Coverage by C/(I+N) Level (DL) ) will be an example
for these 10 prediction studies.
3.12.1 Creating method
1) In the “Study Types” dialog box, select “Coverage by C/(I+N) Level (DL)”.
2) In the appeared dialog box, select the “Condition” tab and define:
� Load Conditions: Either an existing simulation result or the cells table can be used for
the load conditions. It is recommended to select a group of simulations and to check
the “Average” box. The loads factors are “Total Power” for the DL and “UL load” for
the UL.
� Terminal.
� Service.
� Mobility.
3、 Define the Legend in the “Display” tab.
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4、 Click on the “OK” button to close the dialog box. Click “Calculate” on the toolbar
button (or F7 on the keyboard) to start the computation.
The following figure shows the DL C/(I+N) prediction plot.
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3.12.2 Common Prediction Studies Setting
Atoll provides more than 13 kinds of prediction studies, through the display setting the
number of prediction types provided by Atoll may reach several dozen to one hundred.
The following predictions are mostly commonly used:
Prediction types Study types Display type Field
Coverage by transmitter
Discrete
Coverage by Transmitter (select Best signal level in Transmitter
values
Condition tab)
Coverage by signal level
Coverage by Signal Level (full
(select Best signal level in Value intervals Signal Level(dB)
frequency band)
Condition tab)
Coverage by Path loss (select Best signal level in Value intervals Path Loss(dB)
Condition tab)
Coverage by Total loss (select Best signal level in Value intervals Total Losses(dB)
Condition tab)
Overlapping zones
Overlapping zones (select Best signal level in Value intervals Number of Servers
Condition tab)
Coverage by Reference RSRP Best RSRP (RS
Effective Signal Analysis (DL) Value intervals
Level(Per RE) EPRE) Level
Best Reference/
Coverage by DL PBCH Signal SS/ PDCCH/
Effective Signal Analysis (DL) Value intervals
Level PDSCH/ PBCH
Signal Level
Reference/ SS/
Coverage by DL PBCH signal
Effective Signal Analysis (DL) Value intervals PDCCH/ PDSCH/
quality
PBCH C/N Level
Pathloss differences between
best server and second Effective Signal Analysis (DL) Value intervals Delta Path Loss
server
Coverage by C/(I+N) Level
Coverage by RSRQ Value intervals RSRQ Level
(DL)
Coverage by C/(I+N) Level
Coverage by RSSI Value intervals RSSI Level
(DL)
Coverage by DL Reference/ Coverage by C/(I+N) Level Reference/ SS/
Value intervals
SS/ PDSCH/ PDCCH/ PBCH (DL) PDSCH/ PDCCH/
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C/(I+N) PBCH C/(I+N)

Level (DL) (dB)
PDCCH/ PDSCH
Coverage by DL PDCCH/ Coverage by C/(I+N) Level
Value intervals Total Noise (I+N)
PDSCH Total Noise (DL)
(DL) (dB)
SS & PBCH Total
Coverage by DL SS/ PBCH Coverage by C/(I+N) Level
Value intervals Noise (I+N) (DL)
Total Noise (DL)
(dB)
Coverage by DL Best Bearer Coverage by Best Bearer (DL) Value intervals Best Bearer (DL)
Coverage by DL RLC Peak Coverage by Channel Peak RLC Channel
Value intervals
throughput Throughput (DL) Throughput (DL)
Effective RLC
Coverage by DL RLC effective Coverage by Channel
Value intervals Channel
throughput Throughput (DL)
Throughput (DL)
Application
Coverage by DL Application Coverage by Channel
Value intervals Channel
Throughput Throughput (DL)
Throughput (DL)
PUSCH/ PUCCH
Coverage by UL PDSCH/ Coverage by C/(I+N) Level
Value intervals C/(I+N) Level (UL)
PDCCH C/(I+N) (UL)
(dB)
PUCCH/ PUSCH
Coverage by UL PUCCH/ Coverage by C/(I+N) Level
Value intervals Total Noise (I+N)
PUSCH Total Noise (UL)
(DL) (dB)
Allocated
DL Frequency Band allocation Coverage by C/(I+N) Level Bandwidth (UL)
Value intervals
plot (UL) (No. of Frequency
Blocks)
PUSCH/PUCCH
Coverage by UL
Coverage by C/(I+N) Level C/(I+N) Level for 1
PUSCH/PUCCH C/(I+N) for a Value intervals
(UL) frequency block
frequency block
(UL) (dB)
Coverage by UL transmission Coverage by C/(I+N) Level Transmission
Value intervals
Power (UL) Power (UL) (dBm)
Coverage by UL Best Bearer Coverage by Best Bearer (UL) Value intervals Best Bearer (UL)
Peak RLC Allocated
Coverage by UL RLC peak
Coverage by Throughput (UL) Value intervals Bandwidth
allocated Bandwidth throughput
Throughput (UL)
Effective RLC
Coverage by UL RLC effective Allocated
Coverage by Throughput (UL) Value intervals
allocated Bandwidth throughput Bandwidth
Throughput (UL)
Coverage by UL Application Application
Coverage by Throughput (UL) Value intervals
effective allocated Bandwidth Allocated
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throughput Bandwidth
Throughput (UL)
Coverage by DL Quality Coverage by Quality Indicator
Value intervals BER/ BLER
Indicator (DL)
Coverage by UL Quality Coverage by Quality Indicator
Value intervals BER/ BLER
Indicator (UL)
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3.13 LTE-TDD Setting

Atoll LTE supports FDD and TDD schema. Most operations and basic parameters
settings are same for FDD and TDD except for some particular parameters in TDD
schema as below.
1 、 Right-click Transmitter folder, select Network Settings->Frequencies->Bands to set
frequency band for TDD.
2、Select TDD Frequency Band and Frame Configuration in Cells table.
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3、Right-click Transmitter folder and select Properties form the context menu, in the Global
Parameters tab of appeared Properties dialog box, set the Switching Point Periodicity.
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3.14 Other features
3.14.1 User configuration function
The user configuration function allows the user to save the configuration of “Geographic
Data Set”, “Computation and Focus Zones”, “Folder Configuration”, “Automatic Neighbour
Allocation Parameters” and “Prediction List” into external file. This configuration file can be
used in the same project or other similar Atoll project in order to avoid redundant settings.
1) Save the user configuration: Select “User Configuration->Export” in the “Tools” menu,
opening the following “User Configuration” dialog box. Select the information to be
exported and click on the “OK” button. The project configuration will be saved in a
“.cfg” file.
2) Import a user configuration: The configuration files are stored in the folder “\Atoll 282
LTE demo projects and materials\Reference_ data\User_configuration” from the
CDROM.
Select “Tools->User configuration->Import” in Atoll, as shown in the following figure.
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In the “Open” dialog box select a “.cfg” file located in the CDROM, for example the
“User_Configuration.cfg”.
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In the appeared dialog box, Atoll asks whether the existing predictions can be reset. If this
option is checked, Atoll will delete the existing predictions. If it is not checked, Atoll retains
the existing predictions.
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3.14.2 Store methods for path loss matrices
If the project is not saved, Atoll calculates the pathloss matrices and save them in the
RAM memory. When the project is saved and the “embedded” function has been chosen
(default), the path loss matrices are stored in the ATL file. This can probably impact the
size of the ATL file (according to the calculation resolution and the size of the computation
zone) and the project will need longer time for opening and saving.
The user may choose to store the propagation matrices in an external folder, to reduce the
project document size. Moreover this folder can also be shared with other users.
Double click on the “Predictions” folder, opens the “Prediction properties” dialog box. Click
on the right side of the “Private directory” field on the button and select a directory.
The path loss matrices will be stored in the selected directory with the following name
“project name.losses”.
Note: when the project document is moved, the corresponding .losses folder has to
be moved in the same directory. Otherwise Atoll will recalculate the path loss
matrices.
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3.14.3 Tips and tricks
How to import geo data easily?

Drag and drop feature is available for any geo data object to import in ATOLL. To do this,
just select the accurate geo data file in your file explorer and drag it into ATOLL. The
format will be automatically detected by the tool.
This can also be made on PlaNET® index data file.
How to change globally a value for all the transmitters?

The right way to make global changes is to open the Transmitter table, modify the
contents in the first cell, select all the columns and then use the fill-down feature, available
in the Edit menu or with the shortcut ctrl+D.
To select all the cells of the column, the easiest way is to select the first one, then select
the last one holding the Shift button.
How to find easily a site on the map?

A search bar is available to find the location of sites on the map. The Search bar can be
opened or closed by selecting the Search bar command in the View menu. In the Search
bar, type the first characters of the site name in the Find site box. ATOLL displays a
scrolling list containing all the sites, which the name begins with this string of characters.
Then, either select the site in the list, or go on typing the site name to reduce the number
of sites in the list. After choosing the site in the list, ATOLL automatically centers the map
on the selected site. As in advanced filters, it is possible to use the “contains” (*string*)
and “begins with” (string*) criteria to search for sites which name contains or begins with
the given string.
How to be automatically placed in the Find site box?

Use the F3 shortcut to be automatically placed in the Find site box of the Search bar.
How to delete all sites and their transmitters in one shot (or a set of sites and
transmitters)?
The right way to delete all sites and their transmitters is to open the Sites table, select the
first one and the last one holding the Shift button and Suppr keyboard button. It is
recommended to close the Sites and Transmitters folders before deleting a large number
of sites and transmitters; otherwise the refresh of the explorer could take a long time.
How to filter data rapidly?

The easiest way is to perform directly filters within the tables (popup menu available by
right-clicking in the table). OR and AND criteria can be easily handled:
� Selecting cells in several columns and the option “Filtering by selection” in the popup
menu performs a AND filtering criterion
For example: filter cells with 33dBm as pilot power AND 120°as azimuth.
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� Selecting cells in several rows and the option “Filtering by selection” in the popup
menu performs a OR filtering criterion
For example: filter cells with 33dBm as pilot power OR cells with 120°as azimuth.
To check which kind of dynamic criterion has been used by ATOLL, you can open
Transmitters/Properties/General tab and look at the advanced filter.
How to find easily an object by its name in a folder?

Open the folder and type the first letters of the object's name.
How to open or close rapidly a folder?

Shortcuts, available in standard Windows applications are available within ATOLL to open
or close the selected folder with shortcuts.
“Right arrow” and “Left arrow” respectively open and close the selected folder just like “+”
and “-” on the numeric keyboard.
“*” on the numeric keyboard opens all the subfolders of the selected folder.
[Alt+F4] may be used to quit Atoll rapidly when no modifications were made. If there are
modifications, you will be asked to save them anyway.
How to find easily an object in a table?

A Find feature is available in the Edit menu when a table is opened. To find an object in a
table, open the table and use the Find feature.
How to find easily an object on the map?

The “Centre map” feature allows the user to find on the map any object located into a
folder (site, transmitter, etc…). When choosing this command in the associated context
menu, the considered object is automatically displayed in the centre of the current
workspace.
How to customize the columns displayed in a table?

When a table is opened, you may use the “Display columns…” feature available in the
Format menu to choose which columns you want to keep within the table. This is useful to
customize reports on transmitters or import Excel-format data by matching columns on
both sides and copying-pasting into the table.
How to customize the table style?

When a table is opened, you may use features available in the Format menu in order to
customize the table style.
� To change the title style, choose the Format title feature.
� To modify the column style, select a column and use the Format columns feature.
You may also use the Align Left, Centre, Align Right, Bold and Italic features.
How to predict signal level (received from a transmitter) on a road?

The easiest way consists in using measurement features. Let’s assume you have
previously imported a vector file. The procedure is divided into three steps:
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� Right click on a linear object and select the Element properties feature. In the
Geometry tab, copy the list of coordinates (ctrl+C).
� Right click on the Measurement folder and select the New feature. Give a name to
the path, specify measurement unit, transmitter and receiver properties and finally
click on the Paste button. Then, click on OK to validate the path creation.
� Open the path properties window. Choose a propagation model, click on Actions and
choose Calculate predictions. The signal level calculated on the path is displayed in a
related table (P(dBm) column). You may use the Measurements window to visualize
the signal level received from the selected transmitter on the path.
How to obtain a link budget?

Right-click anywhere in the Profile window opens a context menu. This menu allows you
to change receiver properties, gives the choice between signal level, pathloss or total
losses display, and offers a link budget. If the propagation model used by the selected
transmitter is a Standard Propagation Model, there is an additional feature, useful for
validation, called “Model details” providing detailed results along the profile.
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Atoll
Getting Started LTE
Version 2.8.2
2.8.2
May 2010
� Head Office
7, rue des Briquetiers
31700 Blagnac - France
Tel: +33 562 747 210
Fax: +33 562 747 211
� Asia Office
Suite 302, 3/F, West Tower,
Jiadu Commercial Building,
No. 66 Jianzhong Road,
Guangzhou, 510665, P. R. of China
Tel: +86 20 8553 8938
Fax: +86 20 8553 8285
� US Office
200 South Wacker Drive - Suite
© Forsk 2010 3100 175/175

Chicago, IL 60606 - USA
Tel: +1 312 674 4846
Fax: +1 312 674 4847

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3.6.2.2 Coverage by Signal Level prediction.......................................105

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The installation of Atoll is simple and needs an Administrator profile.

1) The naming structure of the Atoll installation file generally is:

3) Install Atoll by double clicking on the installation file.

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Atoll users need to pay attention for the following 3 points:

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The operation flow chart is represented in the following figure.

Open an existing project

-Network data setting

Standard prediction studies (Best server, Signal

Automatic or manual neighbor allocation

Automatic or manual frequency planning

Automatic or manual Physical Cell ID planning

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3.1 New project

After opening Atoll application, click on or select File->Open.

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3.2 Import of 3D maps

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3.2.1 Import of heights map

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3.2.2 Import of clutter map

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C/I Standard Deviation, Indoor Loss, SU-MIMO Gain Factor etc.

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may be disabled by un-checking the right side check-box.

3.2.3 Import of vector map

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3.3 Setting a coordinate system

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2) Then choose WGS 84/UTM zone 31N and click “OK”.

3) After the setting of parameters, the following dialog box is displayed.

4) Setting the “Display System”.

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5) After the setting of parameters, the following dialog box is displayed.

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3.4 Network data setting

The following part introduces the first case.

The “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document has 5 worksheets. The network data are

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3.4.1 Import of the Sites table

1) Open the “LTE_Brussels_Network.xls” document and select the “Sites” worksheet.

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8) Site parameter introduction

Select “Properties” from right-click menu of sites to set site parameters.